Popular participation constitutes a social force which is able to point out priorities and also to influence the Public Health Services, developing policy-making for Health Promotion as a right, in a democratic, equal and participative way. The organization of popular representation into Health Councils has been growing since it was guaranteed in law 8.142/90, making this space become an instrument to inspect actions and to promote the dynamism of social control. In this context, the Extension Project "Integral Nutrition Practices in Primary Health Care - PINAB", of the Nutrition Department of UFPB (Federal University of Paraíba) has been participating in the process of strengthening popular participation in health, taking as a starting point the organization of a Local Health Council within a Family Health Unit in the city of João Pessoa (Northeastern Brazil). This work aims at organizing this experience, through the insertion of students in the process and through the promotion of their active participation in the developed actions. Popular Education was used as methodology, and the operational group Popular Mobilization acted by means of: Home Visits, in order to survey the local social movements, so as to understand their history of struggle; and Educational Activities, which aim to contribute to the community's participation in the Local Health Council, and to enhance the knowledge of the involved subjects, thus favoring the promotion of dialogue and the sharing of knowledge among them. Thus, PINAB could create movements and dialogues to collaborate with the strengthening of participative management in the Family Health Unit by means of supporting spaces of education and information about the Local Health Council, cooperating to improve critical sense and stimulating the construction of a truly democratic Council.
Health Councils; Community Participation; Health Education